Former Prime Minister Dean Barrow Weighs In on His Son’s Exchange with Speaker of the House

Former three-term Prime Minister, Dean Barrow, has weighed in on the matter of his son’s exchange with the Speaker of the House, Valerie Woods.  Leader of the Opposition, Moses Barrow, was asked to apologize by the Privileges Committee after he called her a waste of time and a political hack.  According to Dean Barrow, he doesn’t think that Shyne was obliged to apologize.

Dean Barrow, Former Prime Minister of Belize: “Well the first thing that stuck me was that he didn’t say it in the House and I don’t know that the Speaker has any authority to require a member to apologize for something said outside of the House. But I have to confess that I do not know exactly what it is that he did say, I don’t follow the news as closely as I should and so perhaps depending on the contents of what he said I may feel a little differently about the position but leaving aside the actual content of what he said the principle that he is able to speak and to criticize the speaker outside of parliament is one that accords with democracy and our constitutional system of government. So quite frankly except that he might have wanted simply to put an end to the saga I don’t think that he was obliged to apologize at all. I don’t think that there was any authority that the Speaker could have exercised to force him to apologize since what she complained of did not take place within the House.”

The Leader of the Opposition did submit a letter of apology to the Speaker, except he did not apologize for his expressed sentiments of the speaker.  Rather, he only apologize that she took offence at this statements.  Love News understands that at no point did the Privileges Committee state that the Speaker should accept the apology.  With this factor taken into consideration, the situation could be considered settled.  Leader of the Opposition will be on the Morning Show tomorrow.